September 12, Morning
C. H. Spurgeon · Modern retelling
"God is jealous." — Nahum 1:2 · KJV
Your Lord is very jealous of your love, O believer. Did He choose you? Then He cannot bear that you should choose another. Did He buy you with His own blood? Then He cannot endure that you should think you are your own, or that you belong to this world. He loved you with such a love that He would not stay in heaven without you; He would sooner die than let you perish, and He cannot endure that anything should stand between your heart's love and Himself. He is very jealous of your trust. He will not allow you to trust in an arm of flesh; He cannot bear that you should hew out broken cisterns when the overflowing fountain is always free to you. When we lean on Him, He is glad; but when we shift our dependence to another, when we rely on our own wisdom or a friend's — worst of all, when we trust in any works of our own — He is displeased, and will chasten us to bring us back to Himself. He is very jealous of our company, too. There should be no one with whom we talk so much as with Jesus. To abide in Him alone is true love; but to give ourselves to the world, to find enough comfort in our earthly comforts, or to prefer even the company of our fellow Christians to secret fellowship with Him, is grievous to our jealous Lord. He would have us abide in Him and enjoy constant fellowship with Himself; and many of the trials He sends are meant to wean our hearts from the creature and fix them more closely on Himself. Let this jealousy, which would keep us near to Christ, also be a comfort to us; for if He loves us so much as to care this deeply about our love, we may be sure He will let nothing harm us, and will protect us from all our enemies. Oh, that we may have grace this day to keep our hearts in sacred chastity for our Beloved alone, with holy jealousy shutting our eyes to all the fascinations of the world!